[1] Modified after Zeller and Osborn.
[2] Osborn, “From the Greeks to Darwin,” p. 86.
[3] This claim has at various times been disputed; Osborn, however, accepts it without question.
[4] “From the Greeks to Darwin,” pp. 101-102.
[5] Quoted by Osborn, with the comment: “As Haeckel observes, Darwin rose up as Kant’s Newton.”
[6] Osborn, on whose writings most of this chapter is based, comments that Scotland was “a country which the Mayor evidently considered so remote that his observation would probably not be gainsaid.” This important fact, that the faker could not be contradicted, probably was responsible for many of the absurdities published. However, when we examine the general state of knowledge at that time, we are forced to admit that this is not the whole explanation. Without much question, many of these writers were at least partly serious, and actually believed the impossible tales which they printed, just as they believed they had seen witches and ghosts.
[7] The “Scientific Monthly” contains an interesting article on the history of scientific illustration, showing many of the remarkable pictures to be found in early works.
[8] Carl von Linne was the greatest naturalist of eighteenth century Sweden. He lived from 1707 to 1778, and for many years was professor at the University of Upsala.
[9] In Buffon’s day the Americas were still the “New World,” and it was customary with naturalists of the time to consider it new, not only in discovery, but in its plant and animal inhabitants. For them, the animals of America came from the Old World, just as did its white settlers; the idea of opposite migrations was quite unheard of. How different this conception was from the actual state of affairs can be seen by reference to such books as Osborn’s “Age of Mammals.”
[10] Osborn, op. cit. p. 138.
[11] Op. cit., pp. 181-182. The need of which Dr. Osborn speaks was not by any means confined to science of Goethe’s time. The great characteristic of modern paleontology, for example, is observation without either generalization or philosophy. It is for this reason that the science of fossils has yielded relatively meagre data on evolution.
[12] This was not true of the naturalist in later life, when he was for years a semi-invalid.
[13] “Contemporary Portraits,” pp. 12-13.
[14] “Mammifers” = mammals; that is, animals which suckle their young.
[15] Darwin seemed unable to speak of Lamarck without contempt or derision. Certainly he was not familiar with Lamarck’s writings in the French, and attributed to that naturalist certain erroneous ideas for which he was not responsible. Also, it would seem that Darwin failed to make allowances for Lamarck’s insuperable handicaps, and his position as a pioneer, and therefore adopted an attitude of unjustified antagonism.
[16] “Darwinism,” or “The Darwinian Theory” refers to the theory of natural selection, and the sub-theory of sexual selection, not to the theory or concept of organic evolution.
[17] This conclusion was probably unjustified; his observation covered too short a period to mean a great deal.